Umbrella
by tepid sponge bath
Summary: It's raining in London, and what else can a gentleman - even if he is a werewolf - do but offer his umbrella to a lady who doesn't have one? I believe this would be Lupin/Tonks fluff.


**Summary:** It's raining in London, and what else can a gentleman – even if he is a werewolf – do but offer his umbrella to a lady who doesn't have one? Lupin and Tonks drabble.

**Disclaimer:** The Harry Potter series and its characters are not mine, nor do I make any profit from this, aside perhaps, from a better way to pass the afternoon than staring blankly at a wall. The same goes for the lyrics of _Singin' in the Rain_, the original writer of which I do not know (the earliest I can figure is some time before the Gene Kelly movie), but to whom I am very grateful.

**Note:** This takes place some time between the re-formation of the Order of the Phoenix and the Advance Guard fetching Harry away from Number 4, Privet Drive. And, please, I would like to imagine that the song _Singin' in the Rain_ (or at least the musical score) is playing in the background at the end of this and continues into the closing credits.

**Umbrella**

He didn't recognize her at first. True, since she was who and what she was that ought to have come as no surprise – she could stump you senseless however good a memory for faces you had. He had always _known_ her somehow, though (and it wasn't by smell – there was only so much that he was willing to put down to being a werewolf), but then and there, all he had known was that he was in Muggle London, and it was raining, and he had an umbrella and she didn't.

"Um, excuse me, miss?"

It was more than a little awkward. Remus Lupin was, when it came right down to it, a _nice _person, but he was a nice person who was very conscious of the fact that he was a wizard in a Muggle environment; that in addition to being a wizard, he was a lycanthrope; and that, to top it all off, he was speaking to a woman who (he thought) he didn't know. It was Sirius who could turn on the charm as easy as breathing, talk to girls he'd never met before without sounding the least bit uncomfortable, and if he wasn't chatting them up, he could make them wish he was. Lupin had always stuttered or dithered a little when faced with an unknown female on his own, and he was dithering now, unsure how to offer her his umbrella without making it sound that he was trying, and failing miserably, to hit on her.

She didn't seem to have heard him. So Remus Lupin sidled forward, nervously, and tapped her on the shoulder. In truth, it was more of a tentative poke than a tap, but it achieved its purpose. She turned her head to look at him and he managed to get a generic mumble out before a face he didn't know broke into a smile and a voice he _did _know said, "Wotcher, Remus! Fancy meeting you here."

He realized what was going on and laughed. "Hello, Tonks. Yes, fancy meeting you here indeed."

"And just what are you doing here, eh? This can hardly be one of your usual haunts." She pulled at her hair – long and black today – squeezing the rainwater out of it. It was, Lupin thought, overall, a rather more severe look than one would expect to see on Nymphadora Tonks: dark hair framing a face that looked like it belonged to the kind of young preschool teacher you prayed your children would never encounter. Though it was, all things considered, a pretty enough face. He still preferred the original one though.

"I was. Well. I was just out for a walk."

"Do you always do that, then?"

"Hm?"

"Ambush helpless young women on your walks. It's hardly becoming in a man your age." She laughed again at the indignant consternation on his face. "I'm _joshing_ you, Remus. Lighten up a little, won't you?" And she smiled. Whatever face she had on, he loved it when she smiled.

Merlin help him. He didn't want to go there. As if a werewolf wasn't enough of a monster, he had to go and add pedophile to the roster of horrible things that he turned into from time to time. It was wrong, liking her that much, for all the world like a teenage boy with a juvenile crush, just plain wrong. And he was a werewolf. He would never let himself forget that, or the inevitable pain that one of his kind brought to the people who cared for him. Not to mention, he thought archly, the fact that Sirius would probably pound him senseless for simply entertaining the _idea_ of liking his thirteen-years-younger cousin in that way. Lupin tried to smile back at her, hoping that it didn't come out as a grimace.

"May I ask, Miss Nymphadora, what brings you here? As I recall, you don't usually hang about in Muggle London."

She stuck her tongue out at him before answering, "How would you know? You some sort of stalker now, Lupin?"

"I – I didn't mean – "

"Silly. If you must know, I was on Ministry business, me and a few other Aurors. Complete bullcrap, you know." Tonks snorted deprecatingly. It amused Remus to no end that she would never have thought of using that language within earshot of Molly Weasley. "Something about sighting Sirius. As if Ministry informants had a hope in Hell of getting that right. Just some poor Muggle bloke who looks like him a little. Plays in some sort of band, like. We had to clear out because he came home early." She grinned. "The _look_ on Kingsley's face when he opened the door screaming that he'd dial 999. I wish I'd had a camera. Anyway, he –Kingsley, I mean – dove out of a window and the rest of us ran like mad. Couldn't jolly well Apparate in a building full of Muggles like a flobber worm in a vegetable garden is full of lettuce."

"And the rest of you are?"

"They ran in another direction, I think. I lost the others when I tripped over a, er, my own feet, I guess. Then it started raining, and me with my keeping-dry charms all patchy."

"Well, Tonks, my charms are a trifle patchy as well, but I do have an umbrella, and would be glad to escort you to wherever it is you're going." _Escort_ you? Flaming hipogriffs, what century was his brain operating in? Remus suppressed a deep and sudden desire to knock his head repeatedly against the brick wall behind them. Might as well flourish the damned umbrella and bow. Tip his hat, too, if he had one. "Or you could just have the umbrella if you like," he ended lamely.

Tonks laughed again, and Lupin hoped that he was imagining the embarrassed flush rising to his cheeks. "Wet is wet, Remus. A little more rain won't hurt."

"Oh. Ah. Well, then. I'll be off. Sorry to bother you and, um. See you at Number Twenty-Four." Lupin turned to leave, save himself any more embarrassment that might come along.

"I was intending to take the rest of the afternoon off," Tonks said suddenly. "Maybe get a drink or something at the Leaky Cauldron. I would. I'd li– I wouldn't mind the company."

Lupin turned again, so abruptly that he splattered Tonks with water from the umbrella. He started to apologize in an almost incomprehensible stutter. Tonks, however, was busy laughing, and wiping the extra water off her face – her usual one, now. Merlin, she was lovely.

"It's _okay_, Remus," she said, her hair shortening and turning a deep shade of royal blue.

"You'd _skive off_ work?" It was all he could think of to say. All that is, that didn't involve him shaking her to make sure she was for real, and asking if she meant it, if he hadn't been imagining it, when she almost said that she'd _like_ him to skive off with her. And scooping her in his arms, and…

Tonks shrugged cheerfully. "I'll say I got lost. Which is true enough. The others lost me pretty thoroughly when they left me behind. What d'you say?"

"The one good thing about being unemployed is that I have an infinite amount of time on my hands." Remus smiled, wide and genuine. It was perfectly acceptable to enjoy Tonks's company, the full moon was all of two weeks away and…and what Sirius didn't know wouldn't hurt him. He offered her the umbrella.

She pushed it away, grinning like anything. "Live dangerously, won't you, Lupin?"

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say that all you wanted was for somebody else to get sopping wet in the rain."

"But you don't know any better, do you now?"

"I certainly do not." Lupin folded up the umbrella, and followed Tonks as she fairly skipped down the sidewalk. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his coat, and tilted his face upwards to let the rain fall on him, ignoring the looks he was getting from the other pedestrians who were staring unabashedly at the blame fool who was letting himself get all rained on when he was holding onto a perfectly good umbrella. There was a giddy-happy smile on his face as he watched the young woman splash deliberately through every puddle she met, as she looked over her shoulder every now and then, challenging him to the same.

"_I'm laughing at clouds_," she sang happily, pretending to tap-dance down the wet London sidewalk, "_so dark up above; the sun's in my heart, and I'm ready for love…"_

As far as Remus Lupin was concerned, in that time and in that place, all was right with the world.


End file.
